JOB CREATION THROUGH SOYBEAN HAND MITTENS AND COTTON PICKING COATS
JOB CREATION THROUGH SOYBEAN HAND MITTENS AND COTTON PICKING COATS Cotton and Soybean are the major crops cultivated in Maharashtra. Unfortunately, these crops pose great challenges when it is time for harvesting. At a full-grown stage, soybean plants are about 1.5 feet in height. While harvesting the crop needs to be uprooted or is cut close to the soil. Soybean plants grow only 1- ½ feet tall and it needs to uproot the plant or cut at the base manually. In either of the cases, the women laborers need to squat folding their knees, or have to bend down. Their posture is very unnatural and painful. Soybean is harvested only after the plants get dried up. Fine hair-like spiny fibers grow on the surface of the cluster of beans, the stems and leaves as well. During harvesting the crop, the women laborers work for 7-8 hours a day and pick up the plants with naked hands. This task renders their hands absolutely cracked and bleeding. Despite the pain, the women collect the plants, tie tho